In recent years, Cascada’s Everytime we Touch has become the pre game anthem for The Blue Devils and even made its way to Coach K’s press conference.
I’m old enough to remember when this song came out in 2005 (shoutout Mikeyy BLINGZZ) and it’s really got steam in recent years on the internet at Duke in the last 6/7 years with all these clips, but Duke was pretty much in on it from the beginning.
Duke Chronicle – Before Au’s arrival, the band trended toward older songs at games. It wasn’t uncommon to hear Jimmy Buffett’s “Cheeseburger in Paradise”—a track that would feel out of place in Cameron’s current rotation of pop and hip-hop jams.
The band’s secretary at the time, sophomore Greg Caiola, said Au made a push to bring the ensemble into the modern age by incorporating new songs into the playlist.
In fall 2006, “Everytime We Touch” rose from a foreign hit to a full-blown phenomenon.
“At that time, it was played at all the parties on campus, and everywhere,” Caiola said. “It was that song you couldn’t escape, and people seemed to get excited whenever the song came on.”
Au remembers Caiola coming to him with the idea of bringing the dance-club hymnal into Cameron, but the former band member hesitated to take credit for it. By his recollection, it was a group effort.
“It was kicked around, and then brought to Jeff,” Caiola said. “It came up the band leadership channel. Somebody said we should do this one, and we all agreed.”
Regardless of exactly who on the band’s executive committee approached him, whether it was Caiola, or the band’s president, Theresa Poulos—it may have even been a joint effort—Au took the advice of his students and wrote the arrangement himself.
“At first, I was skeptical actually, because I’d never heard of it,” Au said. “A student brought it to me, and said, ‘Jeff, we gotta play this. The Crazies will love it.’”
Any hesitation to play the song was washed away almost immediately. Historically, the Crazies don’t warm quickly to changes in their routine. However, that wasn’t the case this time.
“The response was pretty quick,” Au said. “It only took like two or three times playing it for them to get really into it.”
Anyway, back to last night. You knew part of Duke’s sell was going to be that he would be playing in front of the best fans in the country, but I’m confused why they decided to make him part of the fans. Last time I checked the players were on the court not doing choreographed dances in the crowd. Which led to the recruits either wanting no part of it as you see with the other five recruits on a visit.
Or awkwardly feeling like they have to participate, which Cooper did. Credit to him for being a good sport, but just such a wild visual of the #1 player in the country being jammed into a crowd of kids with 1560’s on their SAT’s singing a song 17 years old and awkwardly dancing. It’s so insanely hilarious and what makes this sport absolutely awesome. Just the perfect amount of ridiculous and charm all in one.